“Some women wouldn’t have cared.”
She slid off the railing. “I’m not some women, Jedidiah.”
“I can see that.” He blew another stream of smoke into the air. “Seems to me the men you’ve met so far were fools.”
“I have to agree with you there.”
“Hold fast to your dreams, Susannah,” he said quietly. “Someday there will be a man who will fully appreciate you. Don’t give up looking for him. You’ll find him some day.”
Puffing on his cigar, he turned and walked away. Susannah leaned on the rail, clenching her fingers around it, and wished she could tell him that she already had.
Chapter Fourteen
The sun rose just as it had every other morning, and for the first time, Susannah wished she could stop the day from dawning.
She had awakened early and been unable to go back to sleep. She knew that Jedidiah planned to leave today, and she was reluctant to relinquish the peace and safety of the Stillmans’ house. As long as they stayed here, it seemed like there was no murder charge, no Mrs. Hawkins, no Wayne Caldwell.
But as much as she wanted to pretend the outside world didn’t exist, she also knew that if they did stay, eventually the danger would find them here, and the serene refuge they had enjoyed would be destroyed. She didn’t want to see that happen, so it was best she accepted reality and got ready to depart.
She rose from her bed and set about getting dressed.
Jedidiah decided Susannah should change her disguise again, just to be on the safe side. It took most of the morning, but eventually Nate and Jedidiah came up with something. It wasn’t as clever as the pregnant farmer’s wife disguise, but it would do.
Jedidiah had thought about dressing Susannah up as a boy, but one glance at her very womanly, very curvy figure had made him change his mind. The purpose of a disguise was to keep people from noticing Susannah—and her sweet bottom encased in form-fitting britches assured the opposite would be true.
So, they settled for making her look much older. She wore the huge sunbonnet to hide her face, put soot in her hair to make it look more gray than gilt and bundled herself up in a large shawl. She hunched over and walked much more slowly, giving the impression that she was indeed an older woman.
Other than making a face when Darcy had dusted her hair with soot, Susannah had suffered the transformation without complaint. She had come a long way from the snooty and vain princess she had appeared to be a few days ago.
Susannah hugged Darcy good-bye and agreed to the woman’s request to stay in touch. Nate offered to walk beside the wagon as they headed toward town, just to make sure they made it out of Procter’s Corners without incident.
Susannah stayed huddled in her shawl as the two men conversed casually, both on the lookout for danger as the wagon slowly creaked through town. They had almost made it to the end of the street when a body smashed through the window of the saloon and landed in a heap in the street, blocking Jedidiah’s way.
Women screamed and clutched their children to their skirts. Jedidiah pulled the wagon to the side of the street. Nate hopped down and hurried forward to kneel beside the fallen man.
“He’s alive,” the sheriff announced, just another man came flying out of the saloon, this time smashing the swinging doors in his passing. He rolled off the sidewalk and landed flat on his back, groaning. Gunshots sounded from inside the saloon, and then all hell seemed to break loose.
Jedidiah stayed close to Susannah as the brawl exploded into the street. A skinny gray-haired oldster appeared in the doorway of the saloon after the last man had stumbled out, his shotgun clenched in his bony hands.
“You’re not busting up my place again!” the old man shouted in a raspy voice. “I just got it fixed up from the last time!”
None of the combatants wanted to argue with a shotgun, so the brawlers continued their fisticuffs in the middle of the street. The smack of fists hitting flesh sounded above the roar of the fighting miners. Horses screeched and shied away from the fray, and it was all Jedidiah could do to keep his team calm. Nearby, a burly fellow knocked a smaller, filthier one into the horse trough with a left hook, then turned to take on the next challenger.
Jedidiah could see his friend’s blond head in the crowd of scruffy miners as Nate tried to get the riot under control. As much as he wished he could help his friend, his first duty was to stay by Susannah and keep her safe.
A tall, skinny scarecrow of a man flew backwards and hit the wagon with a thud, surprising a squeak out of Susannah. The man gripped the sturdy wood with desperate fingers, shook his head to clear it, then peered with interest at the bounty of supplies piled in the back of the wagon.
Jedidiah pulled his Colt. “I don’t think so,” he said softly.
Obviously reconsidering, the fellow backed off, then turned back into the fracas.
Jedidiah continued to hold his revolver in case anyone else got any ideas about bothering the wagon or its contents. Two of Nate’s deputies had entered the fray, trying and failing to subdue some of the main combatants. One deputy ended up face down in the mud, and Jedidiah was hard-pressed to keep from laughing out loud at the expression on the young man’s face.
“Oh, my God, Jedidiah!” Susannah grabbed his arm with one hand and pointed with the other. “There’s Mrs. Hawkins!”
“What? Where?” Stunned, he followed her direction, but could only make out a mass of ladies huddled against the wall of the mercantile. “Which one?”
“See that dark-haired lady with the valise? The one with the dark blue traveling dress and the straw bonnet with the bow on it?”
“The one talking to the taller woman holding the baby?”
“Yes! That’s her, Jedidiah!”
“She was supposed to be on her way to Colorado Springs,” he said almost to himself.
“It must have been a false trail. You’ve got to get to her,” she urged, shoving at him with both hands.
“I don’t want to leave you alone,” he said with a frown. “And the only way to get to her is through that.” He indicated the commotion.
“Leave me your gun. I’ll be fine. What can happen to me here?” She grabbed hold of his arm with both hands, her eyes wide and beseeching. “Please, Jedidiah. She’s my only hope!”
“All right.” Reluctantly, he handed her the Colt. “Do you know how to use one of these things?”
“Of course.” She held the gun on her thigh, hiding it beneath her shawl. “My father taught me how to defend myself at an early age.”
Imagining how he would feel if he were Susannah’s father, Jedidiah could well believe it.
“You’re wasting valuable time, Jedidiah.” She smiled at him and patted his arm. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be here when you get back.”
Still he hesitated. “Every time you say that, something happens that makes you not here when I come back.”
“Jedidiah, go!”
“All right, I’m going.” He climbed down from the buckboard. “Just stay put and keep that gun hidden unless you need to use it.”
“Yes, Papa, I’ll be good.” Her cheeky smile didn’t sit well with him at all.
“I’m not that much older,” he growled, heading into the fray with a surly scowl.
Jedidiah fought his way through the churning bodies, his frustration fueling each jab and punch. About halfway through the crowd, he thought he heard Susannah cry out. He looked back to see a mangy-looking fellow trying to climb into the wagon. Susannah shoved him to the ground with a well-placed kick to the chest. Jedidiah started back, but when the miner tried the same maneuver a second time, Susannah greeted him with the Colt in his face. The fellow put up his hands and backed away, then disappeared into the crowd. Susannah glanced over the brawling bodies, saw Jedidiah watching her and waved with a sunny smile.
Don’t worry, her smile seemed to say, I can take care of myself.
Jedidiah hesitated for a moment, and that hesitation cost him a blow to the face tha
t made him see stars. He shook his head to clear it, and his vision aligned just in time for him to duck the meaty fist making a return trip. He grabbed his assailant’s arm, twisted it painfully behind him, then gave him a hard kick in the pants that sent the fellow stumbling into the crowd.
With effort, he put Susannah out of his mind before he got distracted again. His priority was making it through the brawlers to the other side, before Mrs. Hawkins got away once more.
He was almost to the edge of the rough-housing when Mrs. Hawkins started to move. She slipped past the other women gathered near the door to the mercantile and slowly made her way to the edge of the sidewalk. Her gaze was fixed on something in the distance.
Jedidiah followed her stare and saw a cloud of dust at the end of the street. It was the morning stage.
The woman was about to slip from his grasp if he didn’t stop her.
“Mrs. Hawkins!” he called out, shoving his way past the wrestling brawlers. “Mrs. Hawkins, I’m a U.S. Marshal! Wait!”
The woman glanced back at him, her eyes wide with fear. She turned her back on him and quickened her pace. At the end of the street, the stagecoach thundered into town.
Jedidiah spat a curse and jammed a man in the ribs who was blocking his path. He shoved past another one and ducked a flying fist, slipping around and between the fighters as quickly as he could. Finally he broke free of the crowd.
The door was already closing on the stagecoach. He raced down the sidewalk, ignoring the squeals of the ladies as they pressed themselves against the walls to get out of his way. The stage driver snapped the reins, and the stage started to pull away.
“Stop! U.S. Marshal!” Jedidiah shouted, but a roar of outrage from the brawlers drowned out his shout. The stage driver, obviously of a mind to keep his schedule, sent the horses galloping right for the knot of fighters in the middle of the road. They all scattered like insects, calling their displeasure as the departing stage rumbled past them, neatly breaking up the fight.
Jedidiah tore after the stage, but after only seconds it was obvious he would never catch it. He stopped in the middle of the road, panting hard, and watched his witness disappear out of his reach.
Nate and his deputies used the disruption of the stage to their advantage, clearing out the lingering fighters. Slowly traffic settled into its normal pattern.
Jedidiah swiped the sweat from his forehead, then turned back toward Susannah.
She was gone.
When the two men had attempted to steal the wagon out from under her, Susannah had, of course, put up a fight. But one man had managed to get the Colt from her, and the other had grabbed her about the waist in an attempt to throw her from the buckboard. Susannah objected to this plan of action and let her assailants know it by using every dirty fighting trick she had ever learned. In the struggle, her sunbonnet had been ripped off, and her hair had fallen around her shoulders, shining like silver and gold in the sunlight.
The element of surprise had served her well. Instead of an old lady, the bandits found themselves confronted with a young woman—a young woman who took advantage of their amazement by kicking one in the face and hitting the other over the head with the coil of rope Jedidiah kept under the seat of the buckboard.
When she scooped up the revolver from where it had fallen on the floor, both would-be thieves decided the goods in the wagon weren’t worth taking on the irate young woman. They had disappeared into the crowd.
That was when she had seen Caldwell.
He stood outside the nearby barber shop, his cohorts cheering on the fighters. Dressed like a city lawyer in a dark blue suit with an embroidered vest of cream-colored silk, he had no interest in the brawl going on only yards away. He raised his cigar to his lips, his gold pinky ring glittering in the sunlight. But when he recognized her, his eyes widened. Then his malevolent stare washed over her, leaving her feeling as if insects were crawling over her skin.
Even as he had shouted to his men, she ran towards the fighters, screaming Jedidiah’s name at the top of her lungs. But the roar of the brawl was too loud, swallowing up her cry for help.
Cruel hands grabbed her arms and yanked her back from the fray before she could lose herself in the twisting bodies. The revolver fell to the ground, swallowed up in the jumble of moving feet. She struggled and screamed, but this time Caldwell’s men were ready for her. Each held an arm, and they quickly hustled her back towards the buckboard. Anyone watching them would think they were only trying to keep a lady from getting hurt in the fight. But once out of sight, one of them stuffed a rag in her mouth and bound it in place with a filthy bandana. The other one wrapped a cord around her wrists, pinning them behind her back.
Susannah kicked out and jerked her body this way and that, but they had apparently learned from their last encounter with her. To her horror, once her wrists were tied, they pushed her to the ground and tied her ankles together, then pulled the rope tight, bending her legs back so that she was hog-tied like a prize calf. Even as the tears of fury started, they shoved a sack over her head and hefted her between them and set off. The sounds of the town faded, and she knew they were taking her away from the main street.
They had put her into some sort of wagon. Caldwell’s cruel chuckle had reached her ears, and the sound incited her to struggle in earnest. But no matter what she did, she wasn’t able to get loose. In fact, the rope grew tighter each time she struggled.
Now she lay helplessly in the back of the wagon with her eyes closed, heart pounding, praying that somehow Jedidiah had seen what had happened. That he would come after her. At this point, hope was the only thing keeping her sane.
After what seemed like hours but was probably only about twenty minutes, the wagon lurched to a stop.
“This looks like a good place,” she heard Caldwell say.
Rough hands closed around her arms and legs, and she was unceremoniously hauled from the back of the wagon and shoved to the hard ground. Someone sliced the rope that bound her ankles, but left her wrists bound behind her. Hands jerked her up to her knees, and the sack was swept from her head.
Caldwell stood before her, his lips curling in a grim smile. Everything about the man was pudgy: his fingers, his body, even his lips. And his brain, Susannah thought. Grief had obviously driven the man mad.
“Well, well, how the mighty have fallen,” he sneered. “You’ve cost me a lot of time and trouble, missy.”
Still gagged, she glared at him.
He laughed. “If looks could kill, I do believe I’d be a dead man,” he said to his companions. “Take the gag off. Let’s give the little lady a chance to beg for her life.”
His henchmen stood on either side of her. One was a tall, skinny fellow with stringy black hair and breath that smelled like last night’s whiskey, and the other was a shorter, ruddy-faced cowhand with huge biceps and straw-colored hair. The tall one reached down to jerk the bandana down around her neck. She spit out the nasty-tasting rag. It landed near the toe of Caldwell’s expensive shoe.
“Now beg for your life,” he commanded, a smile playing about his lips. “Maybe I’ll be merciful.”
“I’m not going to beg,” she replied, her voice raspy and her mouth dry from the gag. “And I didn’t kill your brother, Mr. Caldwell.”
“Give the gal a chance, and she chooses to lie.” Caldwell shook his head and made a tsking sound. He took a step closer and grabbed a handful of her hair, jerking her face back with an abruptness that made her gasp. "Now you do what I tell you, and never mind the lies. Everyone knows there was only one woman there that night, and that was you.”
Everyone knows there was only one woman there that night? A strange way to put it, Susannah thought.
“I didn’t do it,” she insisted, knowing it was no use.
“String up the lying bitch up,” Caldwell ordered, releasing her with a careless shove. “Maybe she’ll be in a begging mood with a rope around her neck.”
“No!” Susannah cried out, digging in he
r heels when the two accomplices started to drag her toward a nearby tree. “Don’t do this! Let the jury decide!”
“Out here we make our own justice,” Caldwell said, folding his arms across his chest as one of his men tossed a rope over the sturdy branch of the tree he had chosen. “An eye for an eye, Miss Calhoun.”
The rope flipped over the branch, dropping the knotted noose to hang suspended before her eyes. Her stomach lurched. This man intended to kill her. And it looked as if he would succeed in doing so.
Where was Jedidiah?
The taller of Caldwell’s cohorts came to stand before her. He took the noose and slipped it over her head as his partner held her arms.
The stout rope fell across her collarbone. Her heart was pounding, her head growing light from fear. This couldn’t be happening, she thought frantically, as the tall one scooped her hair out of the noose. Her life couldn’t end here in the middle of nowhere at the whim of an unyielding, mad-with-grief lunatic.
The noose tightened around her neck, the roughness of the rope scraping the vulnerable flesh.
“Fetch that wagon,” Caldwell ordered. “She can stand on it.”
The dark-haired man jogged over to the wagon, a decrepit old thing made of faded wood and rusted wheels that read “D. Kane, Blacksmith” on the side. He hopped aboard and clucked to the tired-looking mule that was hitched to it. Slowly the animal ambled forward, the wagon wheels crunching over the dirt and grass like a funeral dirge.
These were her last moments on Earth.
Her heart thundered in her chest, and her pulse pounded in her ears as she took in the world around her for perhaps the last time. A breeze caressed her face and brought the scent of wildflowers to her nose. The trees and the grass looked so green, and puffy white clouds drifted lazily by against a sky of startling blue. The sun flickered through the leaves to warm her face as the wagon rolled to a stop in front of her. The shorter fellow gave a rough jerk at his end of the rope, which she took as a hint to climb into the back of the wagon.
The Lawman's Surrender: The Calhoun Sisters, Book 2 Page 15